TO THE nEWLY bAPTIZED23572357 This general
title of the five following Lectures is omitted in many mss. “In Cod. Ottob. at the end of the special
title of this first Mystagogic Lecture, after the words “to the
end of the Epistle,” there follows the statement “Of the
same author Cyril, and of John the Bishop” (Bened. Ed.).
See Index, Authenticity..

————————————

Lecture XIX.

First Lecture on the
Mysteries.

With a Lesson from the
First General Epistle of
Peter, beginning at Be sober, be vigilant, to the end of the Epistle.

1. I have long been
wishing, O true-born and dearly beloved children of the Church, to
discourse to you concerning these spiritual and heavenly Mysteries; but
since I well knew that seeing is far more persuasive than hearing, I
waited for the present season; that finding you more open to the
influence of my words from your present experience, I might lead you by
the hand into the brighter and more fragrant meadow of the Paradise
before us; especially as ye have been made fit to receive the more
sacred Mysteries, after having been found worthy of divine and
life-giving Baptism23582358 This Lecture was
delivered on the Monday after Easter in the Holy Sepulchre: see
Cat. xviii. 33.. Since
therefore it remains to set before you a table of the more perfect
instructions, let us now teach you these things exactly, that ye may
know the effect23592359τὴν ἔμφασιν
τὴν.…γεγενημένην
, is found in all the mss.
“Nevertheless it would seem that we ought to read
τῶν.…γεγενημένων,
which Grodecq either read or substituted” (Ben. Ed.). With
the proposed reading the meaning would be—“the significance
of the things done to you,” which agrees better with the meaning
of ἔμφασις. wrought upon you on
that evening of your baptism.

2. First ye entered into the
vestibule23602360τὁν
προαύλιον, called
below in § 11 “the outer chamber.” Cf. Procat.
§ 1, note 3. It appears from Tertullian, De Corona,
§ 3, that the renunciation was made first in the Church, and
afterwards in the Baptistery: “When we are going to enter
the water, at that moment as well as just before in the Church under
the hand of the President, we solemnly profess that we disown the
devil, and his pomp, and his angels.” of the Baptistery,
and there facing towards the West ye listened to the command to stretch
forth your hand, and as in the presence of Satan ye renounced
him. Now ye must know that this figure is found in ancient
history. For when Pharaoh, that most bitter and cruel tyrant, was
oppressing the free and high-born people of the Hebrews, God sent Moses
to bring them out of the evil bondage of the Egyptians. Then the
door posts were anointed with the blood of a lamb, that the destroyer
might flee from the houses which had the sign of the blood; and the
Hebrew people was marvellously delivered. The enemy, however,
after their rescue, pursued after them23612361Ex. xiv. 9, 23.,
and saw the sea wondrously parted for them; nevertheless he went on,
following close in their footsteps, and was all at once overwhelmed and
engulphed in the Red Sea.

3. Now turn from the old to the new, from
the figure to the reality. There we have Moses sent from God to
Egypt; here, Christ, sent forth from His Father into the world:
there, that Moses might lead forth an afflicted people out of Egypt;
here, that Christ might rescue those who are oppressed in the world
under sin: there, the blood of a lamb was the spell
against23622362ἀποτρόπαιον the destroyer;
here, the blood of the Lamb without blemish Jesus Christ is made the
charm to scare23632363φυγαδευτήριον,
the word commonly used in the Septuagint for “a city of
refuge.” But the Verb φυγαδεύω is
Transitive in 2 Macc. ix.
4, as well as in Xenophon and
Demosthenes. The application of the blood of Christ in Baptism is
represented by marking the sign of the Cross on the forehead.
Compare the lines of Prudentius quoted by the Benedictine Editor: “Passio quæ nostram defendit sanguine
frontem, Corporeamque domum signato collinit
ore.” evil spirits:
there, the tyrant 145was
pursuing that ancient people even to the sea; and here the daring and
shameless spirit, the author of evil, was following thee even to the
very streams of salvation. The tyrant of old was drowned in the
sea; and this present one disappears in the water of salvation.

4. But nevertheless thou art bidden to say,
with arm outstretched towards him as though he were present, “I
renounce thee, Satan.” I wish also to say wherefore ye
stand facing to the West; for it is necessary. Since the West is
the region of sensible darkness, and he being darkness has his dominion
also in darkness, therefore, looking with a symbolical meaning towards
the West, ye renounce that dark and gloomy potentate. What then
did each of you stand up and say? “I renounce thee,
Satan,”—thou wicked and most cruel tyrant! meaning,
“I fear thy might no longer; for that Christ hath overthrown,
having partaken with me of flesh and blood, that through these He
might by death destroy death23642364Heb. ii. 14, 15., that I might
not be made subject to bondage for ever.” “I
renounce thee,”—thou crafty and most subtle serpent.
“I renounce thee,”—plotter as thou art, who under the
guise of friendship didst contrive all disobedience, and work apostasy
in our first parents. “I renounce thee,
Satan,”—the artificer and abettor of all
wickedness.

5. Then in a second sentence thou art taught
to say, “and all thy works.” Now the works of Satan
are all sin, which also thou must renounce;—just as one who has
escaped a tyrant has surely escaped his weapons also. All sin
therefore, of every kind, is included in the works of the devil.
Only know this; that all that thou sayest, especially at that most
thrilling hour, is written in God’s books; when therefore thou
doest any thing contrary to these promises, thou shalt be judged as a
transgressor23652365Gal. ii. 18.. Thou
renouncest therefore the works of Satan; I mean, all deeds and thoughts
which are contrary to reason.

6. Then thou sayest, “And all his
pomp23662366 Herod. II. 58:
“The Egyptians were the first to introduce solemn assemblies
(πανηγύρις)
and processions (πομπάς).” At
Rome the term “pompa” was applied especially to the
procession with which the Ludi Circenses were opened and also to any
grand ceremony or pageant..” Now the pomp of the devil is
the madness of theatres23672367θεατρομανίαι.
Cf. Tertull. Apologet. 38; “We renounce all your
spectacles.…Among us nothing is ever said, or seen, or heard,
which has anything in common with the madness of the Circus, the
immodesty of the theatre, the atrocities of the arena, the useless
exercises of the wrestling-ground.” He calls the theatre
“that citadel of all impurities,” De Spectaculis, c.
10, “immodesty’s peculiar abode,” c. 17, and gives a
vivid description of the rage and fury of the Circus in c. 16., and horse-races,
and hunting, and all such vanity: from which that holy man
praying to be delivered says unto God, Turn away mine eyes from
beholding vanity23682368Ps. cxix. 37.. Be not
interested in the madness of the theatre, where thou wilt behold the
wanton gestures of the players23692369μίμων, the name either of a
species of low comedy, “consisting more of gestures and mimicry
than of spoken dialogue,” or of the persons who acted in
them. Cyril’s description of the coarse and indecent
character of the mimes is more than justified by the impartial
testimony of Ovid, Trist. ii. 497: “Quid si scripsissem mimos obscœna
jocantes, Qui semper vetiti crimen amoris habent; In quibus assidue cultus procedit adulter, Verbaque dat stulto callida nupta viro. Nubilis hos virgo, matronaque, virque, puerque Spectat, et e magna parte Senatus adest. Nec satis incestis temerari vocibus aures; Assuescunt oculi multa pudenda pati.” A theatre is mentioned as one of the
buildings erected by Hadrian in his new City Aelia Capitolina built on
the site of Jerusalem; and that theatrical performances were continued
in the time of Cyril we know from the accusation that in a time of
famine he had sold one of the Church vestments, which was afterwards
used upon the stage., carried on with
mockeries and all unseemliness, and the frantic dancing of effeminate
men23702370 Lactantius,
Epitome, § 63: “Histrionici etiam impudici
gestus, quibus infames fœminas imitantur, libidines, quæ
saltando exprimunt, docent.”;—nor in the madness of them who in
hunts23712371κυνηγεσίαις,
the so-called “venationes” of the Circus in which the
“bestiarii” fought with wild beasts. expose themselves to wild beasts, that they
may pamper their miserable appetite; who, to serve their belly with
meats, become themselves in reality meat for the belly of untamed
beasts; and to speak justly, for the sake of their own god, their
belly, they cast away their life headlong in single combats23722372 The
“bestiarii” were feasted in public on the day before their
encounter with the beasts. See Tertull. Apologet. §
42: “I do not recline in public at the feast of Bacchus,
after the manner of the beast-fighters at their last
banquet.” Ib. § 9: “Those also who dine on
the flesh of wild beasts from the arena, who have keen appetites for
bear and stag.” These latter, however, were chiefly the
poor, to whom flesh was a rarity: Apuleius Metam. iv. 14,
quoted by Oehler.. Shun also horse-races, that frantic
and soul-subverting spectacle23732373ψυχὰς
ἐκτραχήλιζον,
an allusion to the risk of a broken neck in the chariot-race.
Tertull. de Spectaculis, § 9: “Equestrianism
was formerly practised in a simple way on horseback, and certainly its
ordinary use was innocent: but when it was dragged into the
games, it passed from a gift of God into the service of
demons.” The presiding deity of the chariot-race was
Poseidon (Hom. Il. xxiii, 307; Pind. Ol. i. 63;
Pyth. vi. 50; Soph. Œdip. Col. 712), and both this and the
other shows of the Circus, and of the theatre, were connected with the
worship of the gods of Greece and Rome, and therefore forbidden as
idolatrous: “What high religious rites, what sacrifices
precede, intervene, and follow, how many guilds, how many priesthoods,
how many services are set astir” (Tert. de Spect. §
7).. For all
these are the pomp of the devil.

7. Moreover, the things which are hung up at
idol festivals23742374πανηγύρεσι. The Panegyris was strictly a religious festival, but was
commonly accompanied by a great fair or market, in which were sold not
only such things as the worshippers might need for their offerings,
e.g. frankincense, but also the flesh of the animals which had been
sacrificed. Cf. Dictionary of Greek and Rom. Antiq.
“Panegyris.” Tertull. Apolog. §
42: “We do not go to your spectacles: yet the
articles that are sold there, if I need them, I shall obtain more
readily at their proper places. We certainly buy no
frankincense.”, either meat or
bread, or other such things polluted by the invocation of the unclean
spirits, are reckoned in the pomp of the devil. For as the Bread
and Wine of the Eucharist 146before the invocation of the Holy and
Adorable Trinity were simple bread and wine, while after the invocation
the Bread becomes the Body of Christ, and the Wine the Blood of
Christ23752375 Compare St.
Paul’s argument against meats offered to idols, 1 Cor. x. 14–21: and on Cyril’s Eucharistic
doctrine, see notes on Cat. xxii., so in like manner
such meats belonging to the pomp of Satan, though in their own nature
simple, become profane by the invocation of the evil spirit.

8. After this thou sayest, “and all
thy service23762376 The form of
renunciation before Baptism is given in the Apostolic
Constitutions, VII. 41: “I renounce Satan, and his
works, and his pomps, and his services, and his angels, and his
inventions, and all things that are under him.” Cf.
Tertull. De Spectaculis, § 4: “When on
entering the water, we make profession of the Christian faith in the
words of its rule, we bear public testimony that we have renounced the
devil, his pomp, and his angels.”.” Now
the service of the devil is prayer in idol temples; things done in
honour of lifeless idols; the lighting of lamps23772377 Herod. ii. 62:
“At Sais, when the assembly takes place for the sacrifices (to
Minerva, or Neith), there is one night on which the inhabitants all
burn a multitude of lights in the open air round their
houses.…These burn the whole night, and give to the festival the
name of the Feast of Lamps (Λυχνοκαΐη).”,
or burning of incense by fountains or rivers23782378 Fountains and rivers
had each its own deity or nymph, to whom sacrifices were offered, and
incense burned.,
as some persons cheated by dreams or by evil spirits do [resort to
this23792379ἐς
τοῦτο
διέβησαν.
These words are omitted in many mss., and
regarded by the Benedictine Editor as a spurious addition made to
complete the construction. The words ἢ τοιαῦτα at the
end of the sentence are better omitted, as in several good mss.], thinking to find a cure even for their
bodily ailments. Go not after such things. The watching of
birds, divination, omens, or amulets, or charms written on leaves,
sorceries, or other evil arts23802380 Cat. iv. 37;
Apost. Const. vi.: “Be not a diviner, for that leads
to idolatry.…Thou shalt not use enchantments or purgations for
thy child. Thou shalt not be a soothsayer nor a diviner by great
or little birds. Nor shalt thou learn wicked arts; for all these
things has the Law forbidden.” Deut. xviii. 10, 11., and all such
things, are services of the devil; therefore shun them. For if
after renouncing Satan and associating thyself with Christ23812381Apost. Const.
vii. 41: “And after his renunciation let him in his
association (συντασσόμενος)
say, I associate myself with Christ.”, thou fall under their influence, thou shalt
find23822382πειραθήσῃ
(Cod. Mon. 1) is a better reading than πειρασθήσῃ. Cf. Plat. Laches, 188 E: τῶν ἔργων
ἐπειράθην. the tyrant more bitter; perchance, because
he treated thee of old as his own, and relieved thee from his hard
bondage, but has now been greatly exasperated by thee; so thou wilt be
bereaved of Christ, and have experience of the other. Hast thou
not heard the old history which tells us of Lot and his
daughters? Was not he himself saved with his daughters, when he
had gained the mountain, while his wife became a pillar of salt, set up
as a monument for ever, in remembrance of her depraved will and her
turning back. Take heed therefore to thyself, and turn not again
to what is behind23832383Phil. iii. 13. On the pillar of salt, see
Wisd. x. 7: “Of whose wickedness even to this day
the waste land that smoketh is a testimony,…and a standing pillar
of salt is a monument of an unbelieving soul.”
Joseph. Ant. I. xi. 4: “Moreover I have seen
it, for it remains even unto this day.” Bp. Lightfoot,
Clem. Rom. Ep. ad Cor. xi. remarks that the region abounds in
pillars of salt, and “Mediæval and even modern travellers
have delighted to identify one or other of these with Lot’s
wife.”, having put thine
hand to the plough, and then turning back to the salt savour of this
life’s doings; but escape to the mountain, to Jesus Christ, that
stone hewn without hands23842384Dan. ii. 35, 45., which has
filled the world.

9. When therefore thou renouncest Satan,
utterly breaking all thy covenant with him, that ancient league with
hell23852385Is. xxviii. 15., there is opened to
thee the paradise of God, which He planted towards the East, whence for
his transgression our first father was banished; and a symbol of this
was thy turning from West to East, the place of light23862386 Cf. S. Ambros. De
Mysteriis, c. ii. 7: “Ad orientem converteris; qui enim
renunciat diabolo ad Christum convertitur:” “Where he
plainly intimates.…that turning to the East was a symbol of their
aversion from Satan and conversion unto Christ, that is, from darkness
to light, from serving idols, to serve Him, who is the Sun of
Righteousness and Fountain of Light” (Bingh. Ant. xi. vii.
7).. Then thou wert told to say, “I
believe in the Father, and in the Son, and in the Holy Ghost, and in
one Baptism of repentance23872387 Cf. Didaché, vii.
1; Justin M. Apolog. I. c. 61 A; Swainson, Creeds,
c. iii. on the short Baptismal Professions. “The writings
of S. Cyprian distinctly tell us, that in his day the form of
interrogation at Baptism was fixed and definite. He speaks of the
“usitata et legitima verba
interrogationis,”—and we know as distinctly that the
interrogation included the words, “Dost thou believe in God the
Father, in His Son Christ, in the Holy Spirit? Dost thou believe
in remission of sins and eternal life through the Church?”.” Of
which things we spoke to thee at length in the former Lectures, as
God’s grace allowed us.

10. Guarded therefore by these discourses,
be sober. For our adversary the devil, as
was just now read, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he
may devour238823881 Pet. v. 9.. But though
in former times death was mighty and devoured, at the holy Laver of
regeneration God has wiped away every tear from off all
faces23892389Is. xxv. 8; Rev. vii. 17.. For thou
shalt no more mourn, now that thou hast put off the old man; but thou
shalt keep holy-day23902390πανηγυρίσεις, clothed in the
garment of salvation23912391Is. lxi. 10., even Jesus
Christ.

11. And these things were done in the outer
chamber. But if God will, when in the succeeding lectures on the
Mysteries we have entered into the Holy of Holies23922392 These words seem to
imply that the Lectures on the Eucharist were to be delivered in the
Holy Sepulchre, though the Mysteries themselves may be called
metaphorically “the Holy of Holies.”, we shall there know the symbolical meaning
of the things which are there performed. Now to God the Father,
with the Son and the Holy Ghost, be glory, and power, and majesty,
forever and ever. Amen.

2357 This general
title of the five following Lectures is omitted in many mss. “In Cod. Ottob. at the end of the special
title of this first Mystagogic Lecture, after the words “to the
end of the Epistle,” there follows the statement “Of the
same author Cyril, and of John the Bishop” (Bened. Ed.).
See Index, Authenticity.

2358 This Lecture was
delivered on the Monday after Easter in the Holy Sepulchre: see
Cat. xviii. 33.

2359τὴν ἔμφασιν
τὴν.…γεγενημένην
, is found in all the mss.
“Nevertheless it would seem that we ought to read
τῶν.…γεγενημένων,
which Grodecq either read or substituted” (Ben. Ed.). With
the proposed reading the meaning would be—“the significance
of the things done to you,” which agrees better with the meaning
of ἔμφασις.

2360τὁν
προαύλιον, called
below in § 11 “the outer chamber.” Cf. Procat.
§ 1, note 3. It appears from Tertullian, De Corona,
§ 3, that the renunciation was made first in the Church, and
afterwards in the Baptistery: “When we are going to enter
the water, at that moment as well as just before in the Church under
the hand of the President, we solemnly profess that we disown the
devil, and his pomp, and his angels.”

2363φυγαδευτήριον,
the word commonly used in the Septuagint for “a city of
refuge.” But the Verb φυγαδεύω is
Transitive in 2 Macc. ix.
4, as well as in Xenophon and
Demosthenes. The application of the blood of Christ in Baptism is
represented by marking the sign of the Cross on the forehead.
Compare the lines of Prudentius quoted by the Benedictine Editor: “Passio quæ nostram defendit sanguine
frontem, Corporeamque domum signato collinit
ore.”

2366 Herod. II. 58:
“The Egyptians were the first to introduce solemn assemblies
(πανηγύρις)
and processions (πομπάς).” At
Rome the term “pompa” was applied especially to the
procession with which the Ludi Circenses were opened and also to any
grand ceremony or pageant.

2367θεατρομανίαι.
Cf. Tertull. Apologet. 38; “We renounce all your
spectacles.…Among us nothing is ever said, or seen, or heard,
which has anything in common with the madness of the Circus, the
immodesty of the theatre, the atrocities of the arena, the useless
exercises of the wrestling-ground.” He calls the theatre
“that citadel of all impurities,” De Spectaculis, c.
10, “immodesty’s peculiar abode,” c. 17, and gives a
vivid description of the rage and fury of the Circus in c. 16.

2369μίμων, the name either of a
species of low comedy, “consisting more of gestures and mimicry
than of spoken dialogue,” or of the persons who acted in
them. Cyril’s description of the coarse and indecent
character of the mimes is more than justified by the impartial
testimony of Ovid, Trist. ii. 497: “Quid si scripsissem mimos obscœna
jocantes, Qui semper vetiti crimen amoris habent; In quibus assidue cultus procedit adulter, Verbaque dat stulto callida nupta viro. Nubilis hos virgo, matronaque, virque, puerque Spectat, et e magna parte Senatus adest. Nec satis incestis temerari vocibus aures; Assuescunt oculi multa pudenda pati.” A theatre is mentioned as one of the
buildings erected by Hadrian in his new City Aelia Capitolina built on
the site of Jerusalem; and that theatrical performances were continued
in the time of Cyril we know from the accusation that in a time of
famine he had sold one of the Church vestments, which was afterwards
used upon the stage.

2371κυνηγεσίαις,
the so-called “venationes” of the Circus in which the
“bestiarii” fought with wild beasts.

2372 The
“bestiarii” were feasted in public on the day before their
encounter with the beasts. See Tertull. Apologet. §
42: “I do not recline in public at the feast of Bacchus,
after the manner of the beast-fighters at their last
banquet.” Ib. § 9: “Those also who dine on
the flesh of wild beasts from the arena, who have keen appetites for
bear and stag.” These latter, however, were chiefly the
poor, to whom flesh was a rarity: Apuleius Metam. iv. 14,
quoted by Oehler.

2373ψυχὰς
ἐκτραχήλιζον,
an allusion to the risk of a broken neck in the chariot-race.
Tertull. de Spectaculis, § 9: “Equestrianism
was formerly practised in a simple way on horseback, and certainly its
ordinary use was innocent: but when it was dragged into the
games, it passed from a gift of God into the service of
demons.” The presiding deity of the chariot-race was
Poseidon (Hom. Il. xxiii, 307; Pind. Ol. i. 63;
Pyth. vi. 50; Soph. Œdip. Col. 712), and both this and the
other shows of the Circus, and of the theatre, were connected with the
worship of the gods of Greece and Rome, and therefore forbidden as
idolatrous: “What high religious rites, what sacrifices
precede, intervene, and follow, how many guilds, how many priesthoods,
how many services are set astir” (Tert. de Spect. §
7).

2374πανηγύρεσι. The Panegyris was strictly a religious festival, but was
commonly accompanied by a great fair or market, in which were sold not
only such things as the worshippers might need for their offerings,
e.g. frankincense, but also the flesh of the animals which had been
sacrificed. Cf. Dictionary of Greek and Rom. Antiq.
“Panegyris.” Tertull. Apolog. §
42: “We do not go to your spectacles: yet the
articles that are sold there, if I need them, I shall obtain more
readily at their proper places. We certainly buy no
frankincense.”

2376 The form of
renunciation before Baptism is given in the Apostolic
Constitutions, VII. 41: “I renounce Satan, and his
works, and his pomps, and his services, and his angels, and his
inventions, and all things that are under him.” Cf.
Tertull. De Spectaculis, § 4: “When on
entering the water, we make profession of the Christian faith in the
words of its rule, we bear public testimony that we have renounced the
devil, his pomp, and his angels.”

2377 Herod. ii. 62:
“At Sais, when the assembly takes place for the sacrifices (to
Minerva, or Neith), there is one night on which the inhabitants all
burn a multitude of lights in the open air round their
houses.…These burn the whole night, and give to the festival the
name of the Feast of Lamps (Λυχνοκαΐη).”

2378 Fountains and rivers
had each its own deity or nymph, to whom sacrifices were offered, and
incense burned.

2379ἐς
τοῦτο
διέβησαν.
These words are omitted in many mss., and
regarded by the Benedictine Editor as a spurious addition made to
complete the construction. The words ἢ τοιαῦτα at the
end of the sentence are better omitted, as in several good mss.

2380 Cat. iv. 37;
Apost. Const. vi.: “Be not a diviner, for that leads
to idolatry.…Thou shalt not use enchantments or purgations for
thy child. Thou shalt not be a soothsayer nor a diviner by great
or little birds. Nor shalt thou learn wicked arts; for all these
things has the Law forbidden.” Deut. xviii. 10, 11.

2381Apost. Const.
vii. 41: “And after his renunciation let him in his
association (συντασσόμενος)
say, I associate myself with Christ.”

2383Phil. iii. 13. On the pillar of salt, see
Wisd. x. 7: “Of whose wickedness even to this day
the waste land that smoketh is a testimony,…and a standing pillar
of salt is a monument of an unbelieving soul.”
Joseph. Ant. I. xi. 4: “Moreover I have seen
it, for it remains even unto this day.” Bp. Lightfoot,
Clem. Rom. Ep. ad Cor. xi. remarks that the region abounds in
pillars of salt, and “Mediæval and even modern travellers
have delighted to identify one or other of these with Lot’s
wife.”

2386 Cf. S. Ambros. De
Mysteriis, c. ii. 7: “Ad orientem converteris; qui enim
renunciat diabolo ad Christum convertitur:” “Where he
plainly intimates.…that turning to the East was a symbol of their
aversion from Satan and conversion unto Christ, that is, from darkness
to light, from serving idols, to serve Him, who is the Sun of
Righteousness and Fountain of Light” (Bingh. Ant. xi. vii.
7).

2387 Cf. Didaché, vii.
1; Justin M. Apolog. I. c. 61 A; Swainson, Creeds,
c. iii. on the short Baptismal Professions. “The writings
of S. Cyprian distinctly tell us, that in his day the form of
interrogation at Baptism was fixed and definite. He speaks of the
“usitata et legitima verba
interrogationis,”—and we know as distinctly that the
interrogation included the words, “Dost thou believe in God the
Father, in His Son Christ, in the Holy Spirit? Dost thou believe
in remission of sins and eternal life through the Church?”